Destroying an Industry: Regulation of Cigars Shows Government Overreach

In a typical “Nanny State” move, the FDA is looking to regulate cigars to the point of destroying the industry. Luckily, there are few people with common sense in our government.

The Traditional Cigar Manufacturing and Small Business Jobs Preservation Act of 2011 (S. 1461) was introduced by Senator Bill Nelson of Florida. The bill seeks to stop new FDA regulations that would increase the costs of production and sales of cigars in the United States.

New Cigar Regulations could include:

A ban on all walk in humidors, self-serve cigar displays, and mail orders for cigars; new taxes on production as well as finished products; banning of events where free cigars would be available to legal adults; banning of decorative cigar boxes; limiting the levels of nicotine in cigars, thus, changing the flavor.

Senate Bill 1461 would stop the potential regulations put in place by FDA and keep the current laws in place that regulate cigar sales across the United States.

Many cigar makers and supporters believe that preventing this move by the FDA is the only way to save the industry. Cigar Rights of America believes that if these regulations are allowed to go into place, the industry would be crippled and assimilated into to a system like Canada’s where most sales of cigars are limited. CRA believes this is an attack on the free market.

I find this to be a direct attack on the free market and Big Brother Government at its finest. Rather than totally banning the sales of cigars, which would cause immense outrage, the FDA is accomplishing the same goal by stealth. It is seeking to tax and regulate all cigars so that that it becomes too costly for people to smoke cigars. It’s a very sneaky move, not unlike what they are attempting to do with cigarettes.

Regardless of the health consequences of smoking, it is an issue of the government overstepping its boundaries. Let’s put an end to these insane ideas coming out of the FDA and allow greater freedom for all.

1 Comment

Andrew, your essay is weak, at best. Sure, let’s keep potential cancer causers available at least as easy to get as they are now, for what would we be if we showed the slightest concern for the nearly half a million US deaths caused each year by smoking? And God forbid any attempt to alleviate some of the suffering this lung, mouth and throat cancer causes the families and friends, not to mention to the smokers themselves. Such blatant disregard for our health sickens me. Why not make heroin and morphine legal and OTC as well? Let the poor sick wackos who have no better sense than to smoke smoke away, is that what you say? Have you ever heard of the word, compassion?
For your enlightenment:
•Around 5.4 million deaths a year are caused by tobacco.

* Smoking is set to kill 6.5 million people in 2015 and 8.3 million humans in 2030, with the biggest rise in low-and middle-income countries.

* Every 6.5 seconds a current or former smoker dies, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

* An estimated 1.3 billion people are smokers worldwide (WHO).

•Over 443,000 Americans (over 18 percent of all deaths) die because of smoking each year. Secondhand smoke kills about 50,000 of them.

•1.2 million people in China die because of smoking each year. That’s 2,000 people a day.

•Tobacco use will kill 1 billion people in the 21st century if current smoking trends continue.